{"id":160903,"date":"2025-08-20T10:52:13","date_gmt":"2025-08-20T10:52:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/160903\/"},"modified":"2025-08-20T10:52:13","modified_gmt":"2025-08-20T10:52:13","slug":"matt-wrights-friend-denies-committing-perjury-to-protect-the-netflix-star-nt-supreme-court-jury-hears","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/160903\/","title":{"rendered":"Matt Wright’s friend denies committing perjury to protect the Netflix star, NT Supreme Court jury hears"},"content":{"rendered":"

Matt Wright’s friend has denied committing perjury out of loyalty to the celebrity croc wrangler after accusations he became “tangled in [his] own lies” during the trial.<\/p>\n

Mr Wright has pleaded not guilty in the Northern Territory Supreme Court to three counts of attempting to pervert the course of justice in the aftermath of a fatal 2022 helicopter crash.<\/p>\n

Catch up on today’s live coverage of Matt Wright’s Supreme Court trial<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The crash killed his Netflix co-star Chris “Willow” Wilson and badly injured pilot Sebastian Robinson but Mr Wright is not accused of any wrongdoing in relation to the accident itself.<\/p>\n

Instead, prosecutors allege he tried to frustrate the investigation that followed in a bid to cover up shoddy record keeping in his chopper business, including by asking Mr Robinson to doctor flight records.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Matt Wright, standing next to his wife Kaia, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of attempting to pervert the course of justice. (ABC News: Michael Parfitt)<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, Mr Wright’s employee and friend Tim Johnston told the court his boss had become “irate” and was “at 11 out of 10” after finding out he had taken items from Mr Robinson’s Brisbane hospital room after the crash.<\/p>\n

Mr Johnston told the jury he was in Brisbane on holiday when a mutual friend, Jai Tomlinson,\u00a0asked him to “pick something up” from Mr Robinson’s mother, Noelene Chellingworth,\u00a0but he had “no idea” what it was.<\/p>\n

\n

“How do you pick something up that you don’t now what it is?” Crown prosecutor Jason Gullaci SC asked.<\/p>\n

“You ask someone for it and grab it and pick it up,” Mr Johnston replied.<\/p>\n

“How did you know what you were picking up?”<\/p>\n

“That was not for me to know, I was asked to pick something up.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Mr Johnston said after Ms Chellingworth handed him a “folded-up A4 bit of paper” he went outside Mr Robinson’s room and asked the injured pilot’s brother if there was “anything else you want me to take back”.<\/p>\n

“He had a little backpack there and in his backpack there was\u00a0a book and a phone and various other things,” he said.<\/p>\n

“He got them both out but he didn’t want to give me the phone.”<\/p>\n

Mr Johnston said he then took the diary and piece of paper and went to catch a taxi but called Mr Wright before leaving the hospital grounds.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Timothy Johnston said he took a diary and a “folded-up A4 bit of paper”. (ABC News: Pete Garnish)<\/p>\n

\n

“I told him what I’d brought back and mate, he went, he got very irate, very irate,” he said.<\/p>\n

“About what?” Mr Gullaci asked.<\/p>\n

“Taking the diary,” Mr Johnston replied.<\/p>\n

“I can’t recall in detail what he said but I know when Matt gets irate and he was at 11 out of 10 that day.<\/p>\n

“He told me that I’ve done the wrong thing and I need to get it back up to Noelene.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

After the lunch break, Mr Gullaci suggested it was actually Mr Wright who had instructed Mr Johnston to collect the items and asked him if “you understand what perjury is”.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Crown prosecutor Jason Gullaci accused Mr Johnston of becoming “tangled in your own lies”.\u00a0 (ABC News: Michael Parfitt)<\/p>\n

\n

“Are you still prepared to tell lies for Matt Wright in that scenario?” he asked.<\/p>\n

“I have never been prepared to tell lies for Matt Wright,” Mr Johnston replied.<\/p>\n

“I’m putting to you directly that what you want to do, and out of loyalty and out of friendship I can understand it, you want to protect Mr Wright at all costs?”<\/p>\n

“Disagree.”<\/p>\n

“And you are prepared to tell blatant lies if in your mind it protects Mr Wright?”<\/p>\n

“No.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Mr Gullaci also suggested there were “critical differences” between the account Mr Johnston gave in a pre-trial hearing in July and his evidence on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

“That’s because you became tangled in your own lies,” Mr Gullaci suggested.<\/p>\n

“Disagree,” Mr Johnston replied.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Jai Tomlinson said he did not instruct anyone to collect items from Sebastian Robinson. (ABC News: Michael Parfitt)<\/p>\n

Mr Tomlinson also took the stand on Wednesday and denied ever asking anyone to “go and collect some items” from Mr Robinson before visiting him in hospital with Mr Wright.<\/p>\n

“At any point before your visit, had you done any of those things, that is, ask anyone to go there and get particular items from Mr Robinson?” Mr Gullaci asked.<\/p>\n

“No,” Mr Tomlinson replied.<\/p>\n

The trial continues in Darwin on Thursday when Mr Tomlinson will resume his evidence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Matt Wright’s friend has denied committing perjury out of loyalty to the celebrity croc wrangler after accusations he…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":160904,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4740,81995,81993,75302,50,93210,93287,81999],"class_list":{"0":"post-160903","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-australia","9":"tag-chris-wilson","10":"tag-crocodile-wrangler","11":"tag-matt-wright","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-noelene-chellingworth","14":"tag-northern-territory-supreme-court","15":"tag-sebastian-robinson"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115060719227520924","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160903","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=160903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160903\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/160904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=160903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=160903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}